Pine Haven Investment Counsel Inc Has $1.19 Million Stock Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Pine Haven Investment Counsel Inc lessened its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 2.6% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 3,765 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 100 shares during the quarter. Visa accounts for about 1.0% of Pine Haven Investment Counsel Inc’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 29th biggest holding. Pine Haven Investment Counsel Inc’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,190,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Diversify Wealth Management LLC lifted its stake in Visa by 45.5% during the 4th quarter. Diversify Wealth Management LLC now owns 21,449 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $6,600,000 after acquiring an additional 6,704 shares in the last quarter. LVW Advisors LLC raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 2.8% in the fourth quarter. LVW Advisors LLC now owns 19,836 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $6,269,000 after purchasing an additional 533 shares during the last quarter. Ellsworth Advisors LLC lifted its position in shares of Visa by 5.2% during the fourth quarter. Ellsworth Advisors LLC now owns 9,447 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,986,000 after purchasing an additional 464 shares in the last quarter. RoundAngle Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter worth about $1,487,000. Finally, Annex Advisory Services LLC grew its position in Visa by 17.6% in the 4th quarter. Annex Advisory Services LLC now owns 177,944 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $56,237,000 after purchasing an additional 26,625 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

V has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Mizuho lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $279.00 to $292.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their price objective on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods raised their target price on Visa from $335.00 to $360.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, December 9th. Robert W. Baird boosted their price target on shares of Visa from $330.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Citigroup raised their price objective on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $354.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $331.92.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total value of $668,602.87. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This represents a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Up 1.3 %

Visa stock opened at $323.76 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a current ratio of 1.28. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $252.70 and a fifty-two week high of $324.58. The stock has a market cap of $603.12 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.27, a PEG ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 0.96. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $313.59 and its 200-day moving average price is $289.09.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. The business had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.33 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were given a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.73%. Visa’s payout ratio is presently 24.25%.

Visa Profile

Visa Inc operates as a payment technology company in the United States and internationally. The company operates VisaNet, a transaction processing network that enables authorization, clearing, and settlement of payment transactions. It also offers credit, debit, and prepaid card products; tap to pay, tokenization, and click to pay services; Visa Direct, a solution that facilitates the delivery of funds to eligible cards, deposit accounts, and digital wallets; Visa B2B Connect, a multilateral business-to-business cross-border payments network; Visa Cross-Border Solution, a cross-border consumer payments solution; and Visa DPS that provides a range of value-added services, including fraud mitigation, dispute management, data analytics, campaign management, a suite of digital solutions, and contact center services.